Dragu: The reserve fund available to Gov't must not be political instrument manipulated by PM

The President of the Senate, Anca Dragu, considers that the Reserve Fund available to the Government should not be "a political instrument manipulated from the prime minister's pen," a reason for which the Save Romania Union (USR) parliamentarians propose, in a legislative initiative, amending the Law on public finance and Emergency Ordinance 83/2014 on the remuneration of staff paid from public funds.

"The reserve fund available to the Government should not be a political instrument manipulated from the Prime Minister's pen. As an economist, first of all, and a citizen, secondly, I support transparency and budgetary responsibility. I have written this legislative initiative that will put an end to discretionary use of the Reserve Fund," Dragu wrote on Facebook on Monday.

According to her, the initiative provides for financial allocations from this fund only for emergencies. It is also proposed that the amounts allocated to the Reserve Fund be limited to 0.5% of the total state budget expenditures, and that the Government justify the allocation of money in a transparent manner, by clear criteria. At the same time, the Government must present to Parliament a report on the use of the Reserve Fund.

According to the explanatory memorandum of the bill, "from 2014 until now, the distribution of the Reserve Fund has been made without transparent allocation criteria, on the basis of mostly political criteria and in a significant proportion outside the emergencies".

The legislative initiative introduces three new paragraphs to Article 30 of Law 500/2002 which imposes the obligation to justify the urgent and unforeseen nature of the financed expenditures, the indication of the amounts and nature of the financed expenditures and the existence of a public consultation process.

The document was sent on Monday to the specialized committees of the Senate.